“Planesman, hold at depth 250 feet.”
“Aye, sir, hold at 250.”
“Fish is pinging, running in. Cutting wire,” said Weaps, his voice raised in anticipation. “Fish is hungry and on terminal.”
“He’s launching countermeasures,” said Benson. “Prop noise; he must be evading.”
Nathan knew there was nothing they could do now; it was down to the Mk48 and the Yasen’s Captain.
The seconds ticked by, the control room waited and the crew looked at each other and then quickly away, as though ashamed.
“We should have had impact by now,” said Weaps in disappointment. “I think we’ve missed.” Benson folded his arms behind his head. “I can still hear the Mk48 running; it’s goddamn missed. Shit.”
The Yasen was still out there: a threat.
“I’m going to stay here for a short while, then sneak out and get behind him. Ok, XO?”
Nikki nodded.
The boat was quiet. Out there was a Russian shark and it wanted them.
“We’ve reloaded tube two with a Mk48, sir.”
“Oh, shit,” said Benson. “Jesus H Christ.” He was open mouthed. “Sir, the Yasen has entered the canyon. It’s staring us in the face; he’s flooded a tube and opened the outer doors.”
The Weapons Officer set up his console for flood and open outer doors on tube two.
“Sir, can I action a fish setup?”
“Yes, but don’t launch.”
The Mk48 was soon ready.
Benson shook his head. “We’re facing each other down in a duel. You can’t do that with submarines.”
Nathan rubbed his temples. “Yeah, guess what? Nobody told Ivan that.”
Benson was right. USS Stonewall Jackson was facing K-561 Kazan half a mile away down an inverted ice canyon, just like a pair of wild west gunfighters, but swap the Colt or Smith and Wesson for a Mk48 and a Type 53. Nathan knew only one of them would survive.
Whitt and his man skiied toward the muzzle flashes of the right-hand team. They dropped and crawled the last 20 yards to the line of men holding this side.
Whitt could see they’d taken casualties, a medic tended to an injured man. His men took up positions and released fire at the men approaching them. A man to his left opened up with a Mimi heavy machine gun. Fire poured into the advancing VDV. It slowed them, but still they came on.
Further off to his right, a grenade exploded among his men, screams sounded out into the white darkness. It was that close now. Whitt took out his hand-held comms set.
“Back gun, this is Fox one actual.”
“Fox one, Back gun.”
“Bearing 120 degrees, ranging fire.”
“Copy.”
Several seconds later, 70 yards in front, a mortar exploded.
“Back gun. Twenty degrees left, ten yards in. Fire.”
Another mortar landed just in front of the Russians. He saw men blown unreasonably to one side and a leg arc through the air.
“Back gun, maintain range, advance fire to the right. Walk the line and feed the Mothers.”
Mortars landed by the first, and one by one, round by round, punched a line towards the right, blowing enemy troops to pieces. But Whitt knew there were many more behind them. The VDV wasn’t finished yet by any means.
Nathan looked over at Nikki and grinned. “I guess this is your first time. Facing an enemy SSN down an ice canyon?”
“Yeah, you don’t get many ice canyons down Georgia way.”
He nodded and looked to his sonar operator. “Benson, do you get anything from him?”
“No, sir, he’s come to a stop. He’s just hanging there.”
Nathan gripped the rails on the conn. What to do? Launch a fish and he’d do the same; the Type 53 is one dangerous son of a bitch. At half a mile, it doesn’t give much running time: just 34 seconds to impact. If he went emergency deep, that would just ask for a launch; no time to escape. The boat wasn’t low on power, so there was no problem there, but eventually there would be. It couldn’t go on that long, could it?
Nikki came over and stood by him.
“What about trimming slightly for depth? He may match us as we sink, and we can always beat him at that. Maybe get Deputy Dawg to pulse him?”
“I think he knows it’s just the two of us. The Russians are aware of the Pointers; they’re working on their own.” Nathan paced. “He took the initiative by coming into the canyon; let’s take it back. Planesman, ahead 3 knots, we’ll set a time limit on this farce.”
The boat slowly started to move down the canyon towards the Yasen. A minute went by as she slowly advanced. The clock was now ticking, and the Russians would take no action, for now. Come on, Ivan.
“Sir,” Benson said puzzled, “we have a fish running. What the…? It’s getting closer.”
“Where? What goddamn fish?”
Benson looked up at him. “It’s a Mk48; it’s behind the Yasen. He’s increasing revs, flooding ballast, going emergency deep.”
What the…? Suddenly Nathan realised what was going on. “Yes.”
The Mk48 hit home. The Yasen broke in two and gas billowed out of her. She sank into the abyss.
Shockwaves shook the boat, and she pitched and rolled. The crew hung on as the boat was thrown from side to side. Slowly she settled.
“Damage control reports clear, sir,” said the Chief. “Chief Engineer reports clear.”
Nathan knew what had happened. A friendly boat had stepped in. But why?
“Sir, I can hear a Virginia class boat below us,” called Benson.
Lemineux, the Communications Officer, looked over. “Sir, I have a call on Gertrude, it’s the Minnesota.”
Nathan picked up the handset. “Blake, you owe me one.” It was Captain Stanley. “I was on a perfectly good flanking attack, I had an Akula in range, then I heard you were in deepest shit. So I had to haul your ass out of it. Now I’ll have to find that mother again. If I can’t find that Akula, then it’s your ass.”
“Thanks, Minnesota, but we had him.” Nathan grinned. “We were just waiting for the right moment.”
“Yeah, like shit you were. Minnesota ends.”
Nathan laughed, hung up, and shook his head. “Good old Stanley. He’ll give me a stinking pile of it for this. XO, get Deputy Dawg on board then take us to the closest free water outside of the icecap.”
“Yes, sir.”
Nathan knew that time had become an enemy now; they must get to the edge and free water. The boat turned to the east and moved off at 12 knots.
“Sir, I have a contact. Bearing 80 degrees, range five miles. It’s an Akula, she’s coming just to our north.”
“Planesman, come ten degrees south of our track, maintain speed,” ordered Nikki.
“Aye, sir, south ten.”
She was worried. Would the Akula hear them?
15
Major Kornukoff detached the hose from the Il-78 in-flight tanker and rolled the SU-34 fighter bomber to the left. He descended to 20,000 feet for the combat air patrol zone north of Greenland.
“Thank you, Momma barmaid one. We’re on the CAP now,” said Lieutenant Elena Orlova, who was sat to his right-hand side.
Kornokoff led a four ship of SU-34s on a combat air patrol.
“Blue Ghost flight from Blue Ghost one, connecting leg one. Spread out to your station. Go.”
“Copy, Blue one.”
He’d led a similar CAP two days earlier and detected no enemy activity.
“Sweeping radar,” said Orlova.
The aircraft’s radar looked left to right around 100 miles ahead of them.
“Airspace clean, no contacts, sir.”
The flight cruised west for 20 minutes.
“Sweeping radar,” said Orlova.
There was no return, all clear. The enemy seemed to have given up in the Arctic airspace sector. Shortly after, it was time.